Chapter 11
Chapter 11: A Slave?
Xiao Huai Feng quietly drank another cup of tea.
His pupils were black, his eyes deep and still. He did not speak, and only the faint fragrance of tea filled the hall.
The tea was not hot, but on a cold twelfth lunar month day, it still gave off a thin mist of steam.
Wrapped in that mist, Luo Ning’s vision felt hazy. Nervous, she squeezed her palms.
“To register you as the head of your own household and grant you the title of Commandery Princess?”
After a long time, Xiao Huai Feng finally spoke. His voice was cold and sharp, like a sword with a keen edge, cutting straight toward her. “Miss Luo, are you trying to drag me into the crime of great disrespect?”
What right did a prince have to grant someone the title of Commandery Princess or to register her as head of her own household?
Only the Emperor could do that.
“This humble woman would not dare.” Luo Ning saw that he had not rejected her outright and instead sounded a little like he wanted to bargain. Hope rose in her heart.
She gathered her thoughts and chose the safest way to answer from all the things she could say.
“Your Highness is His Majesty’s younger brother and the Empress Dowager’s youngest son. Your military achievements are great, and your reputation shakes the land. If you ask His Majesty for these two things, it will not be that difficult,” Luo Ning said.
She did not bring up “esoteric calculations” or her other predictions.
Someone too clever was almost like a monster. A person who could keep peeking at Heaven’s secrets was someone the imperial clan might not tolerate.
Her last prediction about the disaster at Longfu Hall had only been to gain a foothold, earn a bit more of the Empress Dowager’s favor, and find a way to live.
Now the Empress Dowager even wanted her to be a daughter-in-law. Her path was set.
She knew that Prince Yong had his own troubles too, though he never put them in his heart and never showed them.
His marriage was watched closely by the Emperor, the Empress Dowager, the Censorate, and several major prestigious clans in Shengjing. And the woman he loved had married his brother and become Empress while he was far from the capital city, holding the harsh northern frontier.
From the outside, it was trouble without end. Inside, he had no romantic thoughts at all.
Luo Ning had guessed his sore spots correctly. In this tight gap, she wanted to add a halo to her own identity.
She did not want to just live. She wanted to live well.
“…You have calculated correctly. I can indeed help you get what you want.” After a while, Xiao Huai Feng spoke again.
Luo Ning raised her eyes to look at him.
He did not seem to like how bold she was. His sword-like brows drew together.
Luo Ning lowered her head and did not meet his gaze.
“Princess Consort Yong must be dignified and clever. I do not want to marry a fool who embarrasses me all day long,” he said.
“This humble woman will never embarrass Your Highness,” Luo Ning replied.
“You must also show filial piety in front of Imperial Mother.”
“Her Highness, the Empress Dowager, has always favored this humble woman. Not to brag, but this humble woman and the Empress Dowager do share a bit of fate,” Luo Ning hurried to say.
“If, three years after the wedding, you grow greedy, forget all the things you said today, and start to covet wealth and status, I will send you to the Yellow Springs in the underworld. I will also wipe out your maiden home. I like to speak ugly truths ahead of time,” Xiao Huai Feng said.
Before coming here, Luo Ning had only been fifty percent confident.
Either way, she had to try.
She had not expected that with just a few words, he would actually agree.
It seemed that being urged to choose a princess consort was like hundreds of flies buzzing around his ears. He could not swat them and could not chase them away. It left him annoyed and angry.
That was why Luo Ning could persuade him so easily.
He was so thirsty that he would drink poisoned wine to quench it.
“Thank you, Your Highness!” Luo Ning immediately kowtowed to him.
She was very sincere. She knocked her head on the floor three times, not giving him any chance to go back on his word.
She had found herself a strong backer.
That backer, of course, was not Prince Yong, but the Empress Dowager. Prince Yong would not be patient enough to stand up for her and make decisions for her.
She was going to become the Empress Dowager’s daughter-in-law.
“Come,” Xiao Huai Feng called out loudly.
Soon a Deputy General came in.
Xiao Huai Feng spoke something in a low voice that Luo Ning did not hear clearly.
She was still kneeling. She had already kowtowed, but he did not tell her to get up.
After a moment, the Deputy General came back carrying something. Xiao Huai Feng motioned for him to put it on the floor in front of Luo Ning’s knees.
It was a sheet of paper and a box of red ink paste.
On the paper, the characters for “Deed of Sale” were written in large strokes.
Luo Ning’s heart sank, and her face turned a few shades paler.
“Your Highness, this…”
“I do not lack advisors. If every word you just said was sincere, then you will sell yourself to me as a slave. Sign this deed of sale. In front of me, you will be a lowly servant maid. Outside, you will be the young lady of the Marquis of Zhen Nan Manor and Princess Consort Yong,” he said slowly.
His tone was icy.
Every word was like an ice pick stabbing into Luo Ning’s heart.
“As long as you keep your promise, this deed of sale will not be taken to the government office to be stamped. Only you and I will know about it. But if you go back on your word, I will sell you to work as the lowest kind of prostitute,” he added.
Luo Ning’s body trembled.
This was a huge hidden danger.
This move was too ruthless.
Once she pressed her seal, her life and death would be in someone else’s hands.
So this was the heavy crisis hidden under the great fortune that had fallen from the sky.
Luo Ning stayed frozen in place.
“Your Highness, this humble woman wants to think about it…”
“One stick of incense,” Xiao Huai Feng said. “If you have not decided in the time it takes for one stick of incense to burn, this matter is canceled. Miss Luo, with your status and position, to become an imperial prince’s consort is to rise in one step to the heavens.
“In the future, to fake your death and get away, then register as the head of your own household and be granted the title of Commandery Princess, is a blessing you could not earn in several lifetimes. Even princesses would envy you. Do you think such sky high wealth is easy to take?” Xiao Huai Feng spoke coolly.
Hearing this, Luo Ning pressed her thumb into the ink paste.
She was someone who had already died once.
At worst, she would just die again. She could think about the hidden danger later. Every day she stayed alive, she wanted to live happily.
Her mother and Bai Ci Rong had huge wealth backing them, and no one in the Marquis Manor had a firm will.
If Luo Ning wanted to change her fate, she had to pull the tiger’s skin and use it as a banner.
If things broke between them in the future and he used the deed of sale to humiliate her, she could choose to die.
Death was not scary. What was scary was living and suffering.
Luo Ning pressed her handprint down.
The Deputy General gathered up the deed of sale and handed it to Xiao Huai Feng.
Xiao Huai Feng looked at it quietly. After thinking for a moment, he said: “Deputy General Zhou.”
“Your Highness?”
“Go and bring a command token for the intended consort,” Xiao Huai Feng said. Then he turned to Luo Ning. “Get up and sit to talk.”
Luo Ning’s knees were sore from kneeling, but she answered respectfully and stood up.
Soon, Deputy General Zhou handed Luo Ning a heavy black iron command token.
“With this command token, you may freely enter and leave Prince Yong’s manor,” Xiao Huai Feng said. “I hope you hold to your promise and do not disappoint me.”
Luo Ning carefully held the command token in both hands and answered once more.
“Go back now. I will send someone to speak to Imperial Mother. You just wait for the imperial edict of marriage,” he added.
Luo Ning left Prince Yong’s manor. At the gate, a carriage from the Empress Dowager’s Shoucheng Palace was still waiting.
An eunuch attendant escorted her home.
When they reached the gate of the Marquis of Zhen Nan Manor, they carried down the box of rewards from the Empress Dowager. Inside were one hundred taels of gold, all made into gold leaf ingots.
“Thank you, Eunuch.” Luo Ning rewarded the eunuch attendant with five pieces of gold leaf ingots, then let the maidservant Qiu Lan hold the box as they returned to the Marquis Manor.
On the way, they ran into Bai Ci Rong.
Bai Ci Rong and Luo Ning’s younger half-sister had just come back from the rear garden after picking plum blossoms.
The scent of plum blossoms was rich and fragrant.
“A’Ning Sister, this branch is for you.” Bai Ci Rong smiled as she handed it over.
Luo Ning smiled faintly. “I do not like this fragrance. You keep it for yourself.”
Bai Ci Rong’s smile was sweet. “All right.”
She did not mind at all. Her expression did not even change.
Holding the wax plum branch, she went to the East Main Courtyard.
“Aunt, the Empress Dowager has rewarded A’Ning Sister with more things again.” After the concubine-born daughter and the maidservant left, Bai Ci Rong lowered her voice and spoke to the Marchioness.
“What is it?”
“It felt very heavy. If it is silver, it must be a few hundred taels,” Bai Ci Rong said.
“The girl went to ask for rewards again. Sooner or later, the Empress Dowager will be tired of her, or even hate her. Sooner or later, we will suffer in her hands. It was so hard to finally get a noble rank,” the Marchioness said.
No matter what, she wanted to keep this noble rank.
She had never even dared hope for such a thing when she married into the Luo family.
Since a pie had fallen from the sky, she had to grab it tightly.
Luo Ning was her own daughter. Everything Luo Ning got belonged to her.
Luo Ning always made the Marchioness feel “dangerous.” She very much wanted to send Luo Ning back to the country estate in the southern region again.
If only she did not exist, how wonderful that would be.